Looking something up in an unsorted list is a task with time complexity $O(n)$. However, if the list is sorted, the time complexity is $O(\log(n))$. That means it is sometimes worthwhile to sort an array. However, that is a trade-off as a sorting algorithm has a time complexity of $O(n\log(n))$.
As far as I know, you can not sort an array in less than $O(n\log(n))$ time. I am however wondering if there is any algorithm that can partially sort the array in less time than that? I am pretty sure you can not look up a value in such a partially sorted array in $O(\log(n))$ time, but can you do better than $O(n)$?
In short, is it possible to process an unsorted array with an algorithm faster than $O(n\log(n))$ such that a lookup algorithm can do a search faster than $O(n)$, though not as fast as $O(\log(n))$?
O(nlog(n))
such that a lookup algorithm can do a search faster thanO(n)
" Maybe. "Can partial sorting help with lookup cost in arrays?" Absolutely not (for a single lookup). $\endgroup$